Regulatory Submissions

On August 22, APGA jointly submitted comments to the Department of Energy (DOE) concerning the notice of data availability (NODA) for the energy conservation standards for consumer water heaters. APGA filed comments jointly with the American Gas Association (AGA) and the National Propane Gas Association (NPGA). 

Joint commenters felt it was important to engage, given their members, including public gas utilities and water heater manufacturers, will be impacted if policy limits consumers’ ability to choose to install gas-fired instantaneous water heaters, sometimes referred to as tankless water heaters. Joint commenters are concerned because of the considerable errors in the underlying analysis in the NODA. The input submitted identifies numerous, significant issues, particularly that DOE currently relies on data used in rules designed for other natural gas appliances and not gas-fired instantaneous water heaters.  

Based on the flaws in the NODA, joint commenters requested that DOE restart the rulemaking process for gas-fired instantaneous water heaters. If not willing to restart, DOE should at least issue a supplemental notice of proposed rulemaking (SNOPR) that contains analysis with the appropriate technical and economic data and addresses the significant issues in the analysis.  

On May 6, DOE chose not to finalize a requirement for condensing only technology for gas-fired instantaneous water heaters by maintaining the current non-condensing minimum efficiency requirement. Then, on July 23, DOE published the NODA pertaining to energy conservation standards for consumer water heaters, specifically gas-fired instantaneous water heaters. Previously, on August 7, APGA and others jointly requested DOE extend the public comment period by 30 days to allow sufficient time to analyze the NODA. On August 15, DOE rejected the request, so these comments were submitted by the rushed due date.